Australia. Dubbed ‘The lucky country’, the Aussies managed to avoid major recession during the global financial crisis, and have continued to prosper in the following years during the global recovery.

The country however is in an interesting position however, as the AUD dollar continues to perform very strongly against the major global currencies, particularly USD, Euro and Japanese Yen.

Earlier this week the Australian Bureau of Statistics released the news that Australia’s unemployment rate has remained static, and most of the media dutifully reported the topline number and moved on. But the topline number doesn’t tell the whole story.

Leith’s article covers off a large range of data, insight and metrics, and we’re going to take the four we think have the most punch.

We begin with, The State of the Nation – how’s it all looking?

The chart above demonstrates the changes in Full-Time, Part-Time and Total employment. Leith Van Onselen says “since April 2008. As you can see, this month’s employment gain of 44,000 persons more than offset the prior month’s job losses (-15,400 persons).”

The chart below demonstrates “The total level of employment in Australia has now reached an all-time high, surpassing the previous peak reached in January 2011, although the trend in jobs growth is still quite flat:”

And finally we see that the participation rate, below, measured over a 33 year period, has seen an uptick in March 2012…

…and aggregate hours worked have increased too, which is encouraging.

Overall, not a bad view for Australia at the moment. For the full view including State by State breakdown, all the charts and Leith’s summary on the Australian employment situation, see the whole article here.